editorNPR Digital Services RSS Generator 0.94Julie Rovner is a health policy correspondent for NPR specializing in the politics of health care.Reporting on all aspects of health policy and politics, Rovner covers the White House, Capitol Hill, the Department of Health and Human Services in addition to issues around the country. She served as NPR's lead correspondent covering the passage and implementation of the 2010 health overhaul bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.A noted expert on health policy issues, Rovner is the author of a critically-praised reference book Health Care Politics and Policy A-Z. Rovner is also co-author of the book Managed Care Strategies 1997, and has contributed to several other books, including two chapters in Intensive Care: How Congress Shapes Health Policy, edited by political scientists Norman Ornstein and Thomas Mann.In 2005, Rovner was awarded the Everett McKinley Dirksen Award for distinguished reporting of Congress for her coverage of the passage of the Medicare prescriptionNPR Digital Services RSS Generator 0.94Julie RovnerThu, 10 Nov 2016 14:00:23 +0000Julie Rovnerhttp://wutc.org
Julie RovnerRepublicans have been vowing for six years now to repeal the Affordable Care Act. They have voted to do so dozens of times, despite knowing any measures would be vetoed by President Obama.But the election of Donald Trump as president means Republican lawmakers wouldn't even have to pass repeal legislation to stop the health law from functioning. Instead, President Trump could do much of it with a stroke of a pen.Trump "absolutely, through executive action, could have tremendous interference to the point of literally stopping a train on its tracks," said Sara Rosenbaum, a professor of law and health policy at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.Trump is set to take office at a tricky time for the health law, with many Americans in both parties complaining about rising premiums and other out-of-pocket costs. The Republican-led Congress has refused to make changes to the law that would help it work better — such as offering a fix when insurers cancelled policies thatHow A President Trump Could Derail Obamacare By Dropping Legal Appealhttp://wutc.org/post/how-president-trump-could-derail-obamacare-dropping-legal-appeal
73272 as http://wutc.orgWed, 09 Nov 2016 16:16:00 +0000How A President Trump Could Derail Obamacare By Dropping Legal AppealJulie RovnerTeen pregnancy is way down. And a study suggests that the reason is increased, and increasingly effective, use of contraceptives.From 2007 to 2013, births to teens age 15 to 19 dropped by 36 percent; pregnancies fell by 25 percent from 2007 to 2011, according to federal data.But that wasn't because teens were shunning sex. The amount of sex being had by teenagers during that time period was largely unchanged, says the study, which was published online in the Journal of Adolescent Health. And it wasn't because they were having more abortions. Abortion has been declining among all age groups, and particularly among teenagers.Rather, the researchers from the Guttmacher Institute and Columbia University found that "improvement in contraceptive use" accounted for the entire reduced risk of pregnancy over the five-year period."By definition, if teens are having the same amount of sex but getting pregnant less often, it's because of contraception," says Laura Lindberg, the study's lead authorDrop In Teen Pregnancies Is Due To More Contraceptives, Not Less Sexhttp://wutc.org/post/drop-teen-pregnancies-due-more-contraceptives-not-less-sex
70906 as http://wutc.orgWed, 31 Aug 2016 20:37:00 +0000Drop In Teen Pregnancies Is Due To More Contraceptives, Not Less SexJulie RovnerThere's a new building going up on the campus of the Cleveland Clinic. A very big building."The skylight that we're standing under will eventually cover the area of an entire football field," says Russ Saghy, who oversees construction projects for the Cleveland Clinic.The skylight is part of the new Case Western Reserve University Heath Education campus. The joint project with the Cleveland Clinic will eventually house the Case Western Reserve University's medical, dental and nursing schools, as well as the Cleveland Clinic's in-house medical school.When it opens to the first classes of students in 2019 it will provide an estimated 8.5 football fields worth of space and enough concrete to build a sidewalk that's 75 miles long. The cost: almost $500 million."The idea is to create a 'mini campus' that gives each school its own identity, but fosters collaboration," says Chris Connell, one of the architects, who is with Foster Teaching Medical Teamwork Right From The Starthttp://wutc.org/post/teaching-medical-teamwork-right-start
70699 as http://wutc.orgFri, 26 Aug 2016 09:04:00 +0000Teaching Medical Teamwork Right From The StartJulie RovnerDelegates at the Republican convention in Cleveland have approved the strongest anti-abortion platform in the party's history. But groups that oppose abortion — groups that lobbied for the strong language — are far from unified.In fact, following last month's Supreme Court decision reaffirming a woman's right to abortion, leaders of a movement known for speaking largely with one voice are showing some surprising disagreement.For the past several years, anti-abortion groups have pushed an agenda aimed at imposing much stricter regulation on abortion facilities. The groups said it was to promote the health and safety of women; abortion-rights supporters said it was an effort to regulate the clinics out of existence.At least for now, the Supreme Court is siding with abortion-rights backers. Neither of the portions of Texas' omnibus abortion law that were up for review "offers medical benefits sufficient to justify the burdens upon access that each imposes," wrote Justice Stephen Breyer inAnti-Abortion Groups Take New Aim With Diverse Strategieshttp://wutc.org/post/anti-abortion-groups-take-new-aim-diverse-strategies
69253 as http://wutc.orgWed, 20 Jul 2016 09:00:00 +0000Anti-Abortion Groups Take New Aim With Diverse StrategiesJulie RovnerPresident Obama on Monday called on Congress to revisit the controversial idea of providing a government-run insurance plan as part of the offerings under the Affordable Care Act.What's been described as the "public option" was jettisoned from the health law in 2009 by a handful of conservative Democrats in the Senate. Every Democrat's vote was needed to pass the bill in the face of unanimous Republican opposition.But in a "special communication" article published Monday on the website of JAMA, the American Medical Association's top journal, the president says a lack of competition among insurance plan offerings in some regions may warrant a new look."Now, based on experience with the ACA, I think Congress should revisit a public plan to compete alongside private insurers in areas of the country where competition is limited," Obama writes.The president calls on Congress to take more steps to rein in the cost of prescription drugs and make government assistance more generous for thoseObama Renews Call For A 'Public Option' In Federal Health Lawhttp://wutc.org/post/obama-renews-call-public-option-federal-health-law
68901 as http://wutc.orgMon, 11 Jul 2016 21:11:22 +0000Obama Renews Call For A 'Public Option' In Federal Health LawJulie RovnerThe Supreme Court this week delivered its strongest affirmation of a women's right to abortion in years. By a margin of 5-3, it struck down two key provisions of a Texas law restricting the procedure.But where does the decision in Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt fit in the court's long history of actions abortion rights and restrictions? And what effect might the case have on similar laws in other states and this fall's elections? Here are five insights about the case that provide some context:1. It's the first big win for supporters of abortion rights in a long time.The last time abortion-rights supporters were on the winning side of a big case at the Supreme Court was 16 years ago, when a 5-4 ruling in Stenberg v. Carhart struck down a Nebraska law banning a specific procedure abortion opponents called "partial birth abortion." That win was effectively reversed in 2007, however, when the court upheld a similar federal law banning the same procedure, also on a 5-4 ruling, in5 Things To Consider About The Supreme Court's Decision On Texas Abortion Law http://wutc.org/post/5-things-consider-about-supreme-courts-decision-texas-abortion-law
68541 as http://wutc.orgFri, 01 Jul 2016 17:52:00 +00005 Things To Consider About The Supreme Court's Decision On Texas Abortion Law Julie RovnerIn a decision striking down key aspects of a Texas abortion law Monday, the Supreme Court cast doubt on similar laws in nearly two-dozen states.At issue in the court's decision were two specific provisions of a sweeping law to restrict abortions passed by the Texas Legislature in 2013. The provisions before the court required doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital no more than 30 miles from the abortion clinic and required abortion clinics to meet the same health and safety standards as ambulatory surgical centers that perform much more complicated procedures.Opponents of the bill argued before the court that if both requirements were to be enforced, only 10 clinics would remain to perform abortions in Texas, compared with more than 40 before the law was passed. Such limited access in a state so large would cause an "undue burden" on a woman's right to obtain an abortion, they said.The court has said in the past that states can regulate access toFallout From Supreme Court Ruling Against Texas Law's Abortion Restrictions http://wutc.org/post/fallout-supreme-court-ruling-against-texas-laws-abortion-restrictions
68359 as http://wutc.orgMon, 27 Jun 2016 16:35:00 +0000Fallout From Supreme Court Ruling Against Texas Law's Abortion Restrictions Julie RovnerDoctors-in-training learn a lot about the workings of the human body during medical school and residency. But many are taught next to nothing about the workings of the health care system. One university in Washington, D.C., is trying to change that.A three-week fellowship in health policy for medical residents is run jointly by the George Washington University schools of medicine and public health. In addition to hearing lectures from policy experts in and around the nation's capital, the residents take field trips to Capitol Hill, the Supreme Court, other federal and local health-related agencies, as well as local health care facilities.Dr. Fitzhugh Mullan, a pediatrician and GW professor, has led the program since it began more than a decade ago. When he went to medical school in the 1960s, he says learning how the health system worked was barely an afterthought."Things such as public health were recognized with a one credit course in the curriculum that everybody thought wasFor Doctors-In-Training, A Dose Of Health Policy Helps The Medicine Go Down http://wutc.org/post/doctors-training-dose-health-policy-helps-medicine-go-down
67691 as http://wutc.orgThu, 09 Jun 2016 21:02:00 +0000For Doctors-In-Training, A Dose Of Health Policy Helps The Medicine Go Down Julie RovnerMedical students cram a lot of basic science and medicine into their first two years of training. But most learn next to nothing about the intricacies of the health care system they will soon enter.That's something the medical school at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., is trying to remedy."Clinicians today have to graduate being great providers of individual care," says Dr. Lawrence Deyton, the senior associate dean who's spearheading the new curriculum. "But they also have to recognize and be able to act on the fact that their patients, when they leave the clinic or leave the hospital, are going home [and] living in situations where there are all kinds of factors that promote and perpetuate chronic disease."The idea behind the new curriculum is to more closely link medicine with the policy and public health issues that directly affect it. So after learning about the lungs and pulmonary system, for example, the students do a project on controlling childhood asthma.ThatThis Med School Teaches Health Policy Along With The Pillshttp://wutc.org/post/med-school-teaches-health-policy-along-pills
67665 as http://wutc.orgThu, 09 Jun 2016 09:04:00 +0000This Med School Teaches Health Policy Along With The PillsJulie RovnerWhen it comes to the issue of religious rights versus no-cost contraception, the only thing the Supreme Court could agree on was not to decide.In an unsigned opinion issued Monday, the court sent a series of cases back to a raft of federal appeals courts, with instructions for those courts and the parties in the lawsuits to try harder to work things out. "The Court expresses no view on the merits of the cases," the opinion said.At issue is the extent to which religiously affiliated employers (such as universities or hospitals) need to participate in the requirement under the Affordable Care Act for most employer health plans to provide no-cost contraception for women.The government made several changes to the rules over the past four years in an attempt to accommodate the religious employers' objections while still ensuring that female employees would get contraceptive coverage.But dozens of religious nonprofit employers sued anyway, claiming that even the act of notifying theAs Supreme Court Sends Back Birth Control Case, Both Sides Claim Victoryhttp://wutc.org/post/supreme-court-sends-back-birth-control-case-both-sides-claim-victory
66852 as http://wutc.orgMon, 16 May 2016 20:14:00 +0000As Supreme Court Sends Back Birth Control Case, Both Sides Claim VictoryJulie RovnerPresidential candidates like to float solutions to long-standing problems. Making those solutions stick is another thing altogether.When it comes to health care, the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, rather than tamping down chatter about how to insure people, seems only to have spurred more of it.But you know what? There's a reason some problems are long-standing. They may have no easy solution. Or the solution isn't politically feasible. Or there's a solution that sounds good on the campaign trail but isn't likely to actually work.In the first of a series of videos about health policy promises that sound like a good idea but maybe aren't, Julie Rovner explores why increasing competition in health insurance by allowing sales of policies across state lines might not be such a hot idea after all.One of the seven planks outlined by Donald Trump in a health plan his campaign released in March calls for interstate sales of insurance.Watch and listen as Julie explains why sellingSelling Health Insurance Across State Lines Sounds Good, But Is It?http://wutc.org/post/selling-health-insurance-across-state-lines-sounds-good-it
66711 as http://wutc.orgThu, 12 May 2016 14:49:00 +0000Selling Health Insurance Across State Lines Sounds Good, But Is It?Julie RovnerOn the sixth anniversary of the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, the federal health law was back before a seemingly divided Supreme Court Wednesday.At stake this time is the controversial requirement that most health insurance plans provide women with access to contraceptives at no additional out-of-pocket cost. Specifically at issue is whether a special accommodation the Obama administration has provided for religiously affiliated employers (such as universities or hospitals) still violates a federal law protecting the free exercise of religion.Under the rules issued by the Obama administration in 2014, religious nonprofit organizations don't have to provide contraceptive coverage, but they do have to either fill out a government form or write a letter stating that they object and telling the government who their insurer is so the government can arrange for contraceptive coverage to be provided.The current case, Zubik v. Burwell, is actually seven cases being considered together.Supreme Court Takes Up Birth Control Access Yet Againhttp://wutc.org/post/supreme-court-takes-birth-control-access-yet-again
64803 as http://wutc.orgWed, 23 Mar 2016 19:09:00 +0000Supreme Court Takes Up Birth Control Access Yet AgainJulie RovnerThe fate of the controversial Texas abortion law is in the hands of the Supreme Court, and a decision isn't expected before June. But how this particular law reached the high court and how its opponents have gathered evidence to strike it down represent fresh twists in an acrimonious national debate stretching back to the 1970s.Many of the provisions of the 2013 Texas law, known as HB 2, are based on model laws created by Americans United for Life, a group that opposes abortion rights and that has worked for years to get a carefully crafted state bill on health and safety provisions surrounding abortion before the Supreme Court. On the other side, abortion-rights forces have been fighting the law with data from university-based research on how the law is affecting women's access to abortion services.The court is looking at two provisions of the law. One requires doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital no more than 30 miles from clinics that provideLegal Foes In Texas Abortion Case Are Using New Playbookshttp://wutc.org/post/legal-foes-texas-abortion-case-are-using-new-playbooks
64059 as http://wutc.orgFri, 04 Mar 2016 10:00:00 +0000Legal Foes In Texas Abortion Case Are Using New PlaybooksJulie RovnerNearly six years after its enactment, the Affordable Care Act remains a hot issue in the presidential race — in both parties."Our health care is a horror show," said GOP candidate Donald Trump at the Republican debate in South Carolina in December. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, winner of the Iowa caucuses, said at the debate in Des Moines that the health law has been "a disaster," adding it's "the biggest job-killer in our country."Democrats largely support the law, but even they can't agree on how to fix its problems. Hillary Clinton said at the Jan. 25 town hall on CNN that she wants to "build on the ACA. Get costs down, but improve it, get to 100 percent coverage."Clinton's rival for the nomination, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, acknowledged that "the Affordable Care Act has done a lot of good things" but added that "the United States today is the only major country on Earth that doesn't guarantee health care to all people as a right." Sanders is pushing a government-run "Medicare for All"A Voter's Guide To The Health Law Chatterhttp://wutc.org/post/voters-guide-health-law-chatter
63011 as http://wutc.orgSat, 06 Feb 2016 12:00:00 +0000A Voter's Guide To The Health Law ChatterJulie RovnerHealth care has emerged as one of the flash points in the Democratic presidential race.Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has been a longtime supporter of a concept he calls "Medicare for All," a health system that falls under the heading of single- payer health care.Sanders released more details about his proposal shortly before the Democratic debate in South Carolina on Sunday. "What a Medicare for All program does is finally provide in this country health care for every man, woman and child as a right," he said in Charleston.Sanders' main rival for the nomination, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, has criticized the plan for raising taxes on the middle class and says it is politically unattainable. "I don't want to see us start over again with a contentious debate" about health care, she said Sunday.Some of the details of Sanders' plan are still to be released. But his proposal has renewed questions about what a single-payer health care system is and how it works. Here are someDebate Sharpens Over Single-Payer Health Care, But What Is It Exactly?http://wutc.org/post/debate-sharpens-over-single-payer-health-care-what-it-exactly
62453 as http://wutc.orgFri, 22 Jan 2016 18:39:00 +0000Debate Sharpens Over Single-Payer Health Care, But What Is It Exactly?Julie RovnerThursday's announcement by Kaiser Permanente that it plans to open its own medical school in Southern California in 2019 has attracted a lot of attention in the health care community.The nonprofit, national provider of managed health care says it plans to train students in its own style of integrated diagnosis and treatment — focusing on research, the use of new technologies, and teaching doctors to work as part of a collaborative caregiving team.Kaiser is actually at the trailing edge of a medical school expansion that has been unmatched since the 1960s and 1970s, say specialists in medical education. (Kaiser Health News is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.) In the past decade alone, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges, 20 new medical schools have opened or been approved.That's no coincidence. In 2006 the AAMC called for a 30 percent increase in medical school graduates by 2015 — by admitting more students and building new schools — to meet a growing demand.Kaiser Permanente's New Medical School Will Focus On Teamworkhttp://wutc.org/post/kaiser-permanentes-new-medical-school-focus-teamwork
61282 as http://wutc.orgFri, 18 Dec 2015 21:00:00 +0000Kaiser Permanente's New Medical School Will Focus On TeamworkJulie RovnerHow stressful is medical training? So bad that in a class that encouraged medical students to express their feelings by drawing comics, nearly half of them depicted their supervisors as monsters, researchers say.Students imagined the workplace as dank dungeons, represented supervising physicians as fiendish, foul-mouthed monsters, and themselves as sleep-deprived zombies walking through barren post-apocalyptic landscapes, the study authors, Daniel R. George and Dr. Michael Green, wrote Tuesday in JAMA, the journal of the American Medical Association. They teach the Comics in Medicine class at Penn State College of Medicine.In one particularly harrowing image, a student "depicted his supervising physician screaming at the medical team, causing one intern to urinate herself moments before having her head bitten off for possessing too little information about a patient," the authors wrote.While the article referred to only the 66 fourth-year students who have taken the humanities classMedical Students See Their Mentors As Marauding Monstershttp://wutc.org/post/medical-students-see-their-mentors-maurading-monsters
60872 as http://wutc.orgTue, 08 Dec 2015 16:08:00 +0000Medical Students See Their Mentors As Marauding MonstersJulie RovnerMedicine, meet Big Data.For generations, physicians have been trained in basic science and human anatomy to diagnose and treat the patient immediately in front of them.But now, massive stores of data about what works for which patients are literally changing the way medicine is practiced."That's how we make decisions; we make them based on the truth and the evidence that are present in those data," says Marc Triola, an associate dean for educational informatics at New York University's medical school.Figuring out how to access and interpret all that data is not a skill that most physicians learned in medical school — but that's changing."If you don't have these skills, you could really be at a disadvantage," says Triola, "in terms of the way you understand the quality and the efficiency of the care you're delivering."That's why every first and second year student at the NYU School of Medicine is required to do what's called a 'health care by the numbers' project. Students are givenMedical Students Crunch Big Data To Spot Health Trendshttp://wutc.org/post/medical-students-crunch-big-data-spot-health-trends
59356 as http://wutc.orgFri, 30 Oct 2015 18:21:00 +0000Medical Students Crunch Big Data To Spot Health TrendsJulie RovnerThe percentage of Americans without health insurance dropped by nearly three percentage points between 2013 and 2014, according the U.S. Census Bureau, from 13.3 to 10.4 percent. Put another way, 8.8 million more people were insured in 2014 than the year before.The annual study from Census is considered the definitive measure of health insurance, although a change in the way health insurance questions are asked make this year's report comparable to 2013 but not earlier years.Census officials, however, point out that a different annual survey that has asked health insurance questions consistently show this to be the biggest drop in the uninsured since at least 2008.Others say the sizable increase in Americans with insurance — due in large part to the implementation of the federal health law — is unprecedented since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid 50 years ago."It's probably the biggest drop ever," said Paul Fronstin, director of health research at the Employee Benefit ResearchObamacare Enrollment Triggers Drop In The Uninsured Ratehttp://wutc.org/post/obamacare-enrollment-triggers-drop-uninsured-rate
57541 as http://wutc.orgWed, 16 Sep 2015 18:33:00 +0000Obamacare Enrollment Triggers Drop In The Uninsured RateJulie RovnerFederal funding for Planned Parenthood will clearly be a flashpoint when Congress returns this week from its summer break.But the fate of many other health programs, from the National Institutes of Health to efforts to reduce teen pregnancy, hang in the balance as well, as lawmakers decide whether and how to fund the government after the current fiscal year expires Sept. 30.The Planned Parenthood fight could figure prominently in the coming legislative negotiation. Many GOP lawmakers, led by those running for president, have spent the summer pummeling the group for alleged mishandling of fetal tissue for research. They have vowed not to vote for any spending bill that allows federal funding for the organization, even if that means closing down the rest of the federal government. And that is despite the assertion last week from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., that there aren't enough votes to approve defunding, given a likely veto from President Barack Obama.But PlannedCongress Weighs Budget Cuts For Wide Range Of Health Programshttp://wutc.org/post/congress-weighs-budget-cuts-wide-range-health-programs
57193 as http://wutc.orgTue, 08 Sep 2015 16:16:00 +0000Congress Weighs Budget Cuts For Wide Range Of Health Programs